Cultural Differences
by MicroChips
Summary: Two Canadian nurses go to the 4077th on an exchange, and some cultural differences cause trouble for everyone involved. I'm back!
1. What the Hell are We Doing Here Anyway?

Title: Cultural Differences

Author: MicroChips

Disclaimer: Don't own MASH, want to but don't…

Summary: Two Canadian nurses go to the 4077th on an exchange, and some "cultural differences" cause trouble for everyone involved.

Notes: First MASH thing. Apologies for some badness… But it will be better… I hope.

Chapter One: What on Earth are We Doing Here Any Way?

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Knock, knock, knock.

She groaned and rolled over, covering her pounding skull with the blanket.

"If you wish to keep that offending appendage where it is, you'll turn around and run off!"she growled. Someone outside the door sighed and opened the makeshift door, cracking it annoyingly.

"Alex, get your lazy derrière out of bed before I extract you with a hot fire poker." The woman said. Alex slowly felt consciousness coming back to her. She was fighting desperately for more sleep.

"Alex isn't at home right now. Please leave a note and she will burn it before getting back to you." She replied. The other woman pulled the blanket off of her head.

"That a good enough message for you?" she said, her brown eyes flashing in the light. Alex snapped her eyes shut from the light and groaned.

"Unfortunately. Can't you just honor the dead and let them rest in pieces?" she groaned rolling over.

"No I can't. That's a morticians of a bar maids job." The person moved around the room as Alex sat up. "Besides its your own fault that-"

"I got drunk last night. Yes I have heard it all before Mother Meg…" Alex rolled her eyes at Meg who was looking at the floor in disgust. She stood in an ankle deep in Alex's junk.

"How the hell do you live in this pigsty?" she asked disgusted.

"By ignoring it. I'm not a neat freak unlike thyself." Alex said simply, reaching under her cot for a hairbrush. She found it and immediately began to run it through her shoulder length wavy red hair.

"You had better clean it up. You've got twenty minutes… EEK!" Meg yelled, jumping backwards as a small rat scuttled across the floor. "Good god, even a rat calls this pigsty home!"

"Don't be mean to pigs. They are actually very clean animals, unlike humans of course." Alex put the hairbrush down. " What do you mean twenty minutes?"

"Well then even a pig could live here. This place is a bloody mess! A bomb went off in here didn't it?"

"Not to my knowledge… What's with the twenty minutes?"

"Disgusting! How can you live here?"

"The same way that you keep avoiding my question. I ignore it! Now tell me, twenty minutes till what?" Alex said, throwing a really dirty look at her.

"Oh yeah. The exchange thing…" Meg said distractedly, picking up a broom and hitting the floor to flush out any other vermin. Alex finally woke up properly.

"Oh holy maple syrup!" she said jumping out of the cot. She began to shoot around the room, packing her suitcase and getting changed at the same time. Meg grinned at her. Over the three months that they had been in Korea, she had learned more about her cousin Alex than she ever thought existed. Alex and Meg had been best friends all of their lives. They had been born on the same day and in the exact same hour, and in the same hospital as each other. Alex had never had many friends due to the fact that she was a social misfit. Meg was also in the same boat, but she had never had any friends because of her heritage. Her mother's mother had been half-Japanese and half-German. Out of the weird mix of Japanese, German, and Canadian, Megumi Lexington was 1/8 Japanese, 1/8 German and 3/4 Canadian. She had inherited her first name from said offending grandmother, and from her had also gained her strait black hair.

Alex on the other hand, always had been and always would be a tomboy. She would never be seen dead in a skirt or dress and had set fire to all the make-up that her mother had hidden in her room incase she stumbled across it and decided to try it on. The full-blooded Canadian tomboy had even attempted to apply to every medical school in the country to become a surgeon like her father. She was a very optimistic and outgoing person, always trying to get better and learn something new. Life was a game to her; you only won when you knew everything there was to know. Her only downfall was she would do anything once, and if she liked the affects, many more times after that. She had a nasty habit of drinking, smoking and gambling. She hated people who thought that they were better than her, so the fact that she even held her rank of Major for so long had astounded Meg.

"What are you smirking at Megumi?" Alex asked impertinently leaning back from behind her closet to glare at her cousin. A nasty grin spread across her face. "That grin is so sickly that it's causing your lovely lines to peel."

"Oh hardy har Alex." Meg muttered. She subconsciously ran her fingers over her collar and fiddled with her badge. The three thick yellow lines were perfectly unharmed on the green background, but knowing Alex, she wasn't going to take any chances that she might, for once in her life, be serious. Alex chuckled at her and stepped back from the closet, now wearing the formal khaki skirt and shirt of the army. She adjusted her collar, running her finger over her own stripes; two thick yellow lines around a thin one.

"Oh come on Meg, do you really think that anything would happen to them without you noticing?" she aid with a chuckle, rummaging around for a pair of shoes. She finally found them under her bed and threw them on. She quickly reached up and grabbed the formal hat on top of the dresser and the Stetson that was beside it.

"Which should I wear? The triangle or the Stetson?" she asked Meg. Meg looked at her critically for a second.

"You look better in the Stetson I'll give you that. But take the formal one too, just in case." Meg replied with a smile. Alex grinned at her.

"Always letting the rules go for me huh?" she said, throwing the formal hat in the bag and placing the Stetson back on her head. "How long till we have to go?" Meg looked at her watch.

"Ten minutes."

"Okay. Is the Jeep already here?"

"Yeah came in when I came to get you up. I sent the driver to get a drink from the mess tent." Meg grinned slightly. Alex looked at her a dumbfounded expression crossing her face.

"You murderer…" she hissed comically. Meg shrugged.

"I warned him not to eat the food. He said that he just wanted a drink!"

"You willingly fed someone food packaged in 1812…" Alex shook her head and picked up her bag. "Shall we go and save him from his fate?"

"What's left of him we shall attempt to save!" Meg exclaimed in mock righteousness as she turned to open the door. Alex bolted out past her into the sunlight but waited for her to come out of the tent.

"Why did you do that?" Meg asked, blinking in confusion.

"I like big exits." Alex replied with a shrug. She looked around for half a second. "So, where is this Jeep?"

"By the mess tent." Meg said knowing fully well what was coming next.

"What?!" Alex exclaimed. She dropped the bag on her foot and immediately began hopping around in pain. "All the way over there?"

"Yes all the way over there."

"But that is so far…" Alex put on her best whiny tone. Meg stopped and rolled her eyes at her cousin.

"Good god Alex, you are so laconic! Get your indolent ass over to that jeep, NOW!"

"Is that an order?" Alex asked meekly.

"YES!" Meg was turning slightly red.

"Okay, all you had to do was say please." Alex walked past Meg grinning evilly. Meg sighed again, hating Alex ever so slightly.

"You are so damned annoying Lex…" she snarled following Alex.

"I try." Alex replied simply.

"And you succeed." Meg groaned. After a few seconds of walking they came to the jeep. Alex threw her bag in it and leaned against the door. With the hat pulled down over her eyes, she looked pretty comical.

"Do I look mysterious?" she asked with a chuckle.

"No you look like a dork." Meg replied with a chuckle. Alex flicked the brim of her hat up with a finger and sighed at her Meg.

"Fine whatever you say." She said with a sigh. The door to the mess tent suddenly cracked open and an unfamiliar corporal walked out, chewing something rapidly. Meg and Alex looked at him weirdly.

"Corporal… did you by any chance just eat in there?" Meg asked frowning.

"Yes ma'am, you guys have better food than we do!" the corporal replied smiling. Alex just blinked slightly before pulling herself together.

"Are you taking us to the 4077th?" she asked. The corporal looked at her and blinked slightly.

"Yes Major I am. I'm, umm, Corporal O'Reilly, Company Clerk for the 4077th." He replied shyly. Alex smiled warmly at him.

"Well, well Corporal O'Reilly. I do believe that you should get a Purple Heart for eating in there. I'm amazed that you came out alive." She said in a joking tone.

"Oh no ma'am, the food here is better than ours!" he repeated slightly flabbergasted.

"I was kidding. That stuff's better than what they give to the people in the field. Heck even powder is better than the crap that they give to the civilians here." Alex was beginning to head towards a rant. Meg quickly flicked the back of her Stetson and sent it flying to the floor. She moved so fast that in mind grumble Alex had no time to find out who hit it.

"Well corporal, shall we get going? Three minutes won't make too much of a difference on travel time." Meg walked around to the back of the jeep as she spoke loudly, hoping that Alex would get the point. As she climbed in the back seat, she turned to look at Alex, who was glaring furiously at her. Suddenly a dawning of realization appeared on her cousin's face, and she gave up glaring at Meg. She quickly climbed into the jeep next to Corporal O'Reilly.

"Hi-ho Silver, away!" Alex exclaimed, mostly as a joke. As she jeep took off she turned to Meg and smiled.

"You have two hours today when I treat you as my superior. Make them last." She said quietly to her.

Twenty Minutes Later

"I spy with my little eye, something beginning with 'K'" Alex said in an extremely bored tone.

"Korea?" Meg asked unenthusiastically. The lack of intonation made Alex chuckle slightly.

"Bingo Meg, your turn."

"I spy with my little eye something beginning with 'S'"

"Scrub brush?" O'Reilly offered.

"Nope." Meg said with a smirk.

"The Seine River." Alex spat out without thinking.

"The Seine River is in Germany nitwit."

"Do nits have wits?"

"I don't know Alex do you?"

"What does this have to do with 'I Spy?'" O'Reilly asked himself.

"Absolutely nothing." Alex replied. She looked up at the sky and thought for half a second. A piercing whistle like air being let out of a balloon filled the air. "Shells…"

"Of course not shells Alex! If I was close enough to spy a shell I'd be-"

"No Meg, there are shells dropping from the sky as we speak!" Alex managed to exclaim before a shell hit the ground about ten feet behind the jeep. A second shell hit just in front of the moving target.

"Jesus Christ Corporal, FLOOR IT!" Meg yelled grabbing Alex's hat as it flew past her face.

"We're almost there! It's just around the bend!" he yelled back slightly jumpily. Alex blocked everything out for half a second as she took a glance at the war torn countryside.

"What the hell are we doing here anyway?" she asked herself quietly. Meg placed a hand on her shoulder.

"We're here for the exchange thing Alex." She said almost as quietly.

"You know what I mean. Why are we in Korea?"

"The person who could answer that would be the richest person in the world." Meg sighed. "A bloody rich bugger…" A shell hit the ground as the whipped around the bend into the 4077th. Various people were still running around attempting to get into one of the permanent, half shellproof buildings that the majority of MASH's had. O'Reilly barreled the jeep through the compound and parked it next to a notice board.

"Go in sirs" he said cutting the engine and almost hiding under the dash as another shell hit, " I'll get your bags."

"No thanks Corporal," Meg said with a smile," We're used to shells." She grabbed Alex's bag and threw it at her as she climbed out of the jeep. Alex had been prepared and span around as her feet touched the dirt to grab it.

"Gotta be faster Meg." She said smugly. O'Reilly glanced at them weirdly before scrambling into the building. Alex and Meg followed him attempting not to yawn. Shells weren't that threatening to them, not any more. As soon as they opened the makeshift door, another shell hit that rattled the building. A scuffle of movement and a squeak of surprise alerted them to the fact that there were other people in the room. They both looked around the small office like room to see three men and a woman crouching on the floor behind a pile of sandbags. Alex raised an eyebrow and smirked as she placed her bag down. She pulled the hat off of her head and placed it on top of the bag.

"So Radar, where did you get these two from?" one of the men asked a cheesy grin plastered all over his face. He ran a hand through his black hair as he stared at Meg with a slightly predatory look in his blue eyes. Alex quickly looked at his shirt collar. He has no pins to identify his rank, nor did he have any "V's" on his sleeve. Alex looked at Meg who was playing at the golden ring on her finger suggestively.

"They are the exchange people from the Canadian regiment sir." Radar replied.

__

Radar… why Radar? Alex wondered.

"Do you two angels have names?" the man asked.

"Pierce, they're a Major and a Lt. Colonel," the woman snapped, "Why would you want to know their names?" She stood up and offered her hand to Meg, smiling widely. "I'm Major Margaret Houilhan, head nurse." Meg took her hand, slightly taken aback, and shook it.

"Lt. Colonel Megumi Lexington. This is Major Alex Lexington, the head nurse at our unit," Meg gestured towards Alex. Alex only caught it out of the corner of her eye as she was looking at the one named Pierce. He had been whispering something to the man behind him and the pair of them had begun chuckling. She turned to Margaret and smiled brightly. After all, she had promised Meg that she would be nice. Margaret reached over to shake Alex's hand.

"You're the head nurse?" she asked her smile fading slightly for Alex.

"Yes I am." Alex replied shaking her hand, a slightly frosty tone entering her voice. Meg caught it and began chewing her bottom lip in anticipation of some more trouble. Another shell hit the compound and sent dust trickling down from the ceiling. Once again, everyone in the room covered their heads aside from Alex and Meg. The man who had been sitting with Margaret stood up and shot over to Meg to shake her hand.

"I'm Major Frank Burns one of the surgeons here," he said. Meg looked over at Alex, who was trying not to show that she was in fits of silent giggles, with a look of pure helplessness.

"Nice to meet you Major." She said with a severely forced smile. She had a weird feeling about Frank and it wasn't a good one. The other two men stood up and came over to Alex, who had finally managed to stop her silent giggles.

"Hawkeye Pierce at your service ma'am," Pierce said with a mock bow.

"Captain B.J. Hunnicut, swearing my allegiance to you fair lady," the second one said. Alex smirked at them, but choked back the comment she wanted to make.

"Thank you Captain, Hawkeye," she said, "I will remember this well." She took a quick look to the two majors and Meg. The Majors were talking rapidly to Meg and looking over continuously at the other two men. "Why Hawkeye? I swear I have heard that name somewhere before…"

"It's from _The Last of the Mohicans._ It was my dad's favorite book, so I gained the nickname from it." Hawkeye replied the cheesy grin still plastered to his face. Alex looked thoughtful for a second. Frank began to point at Hawkeye as inconspicuously as possible.

"Does Major Burns have something against you Hawkeye?" she asked.

"Why do you say that?" Hawkeye asked.

"He's telling my cousin how much of a snot you are." Alex replied simply. Hawkeye frowned slightly.

"Major Burns, or Ferret Face as he is often called, dislikes us both intensely. Maybe its because his shorts are too tight, maybe its because his brain has had a very small leak over the past year or so. That question is completely unanswerable." He replied quietly. "How do you know that they are talking about us?"

"I can read lips." Alex said calmly.

"Right." Hawkeye said sarcastically rolling his eyes.

"No really I'm not lying. For example, the question you asked, or rather joke you told Captain Hunnicut about my cousin is thoroughly false." Alex smiled, "She isn't that easy." Radar managed to save anyone from any further questions, jokes or personality bashing by coming out of the CO's office right then and there.

"Lt. Colonel and Major Lexington, Colonel Potter will see you now," he said quietly.

"This place sounds a lot like a doctors office now…" Alex muttered with a smirk before pushing past the Captains and walking over to Meg.

"Shall we my dear?" she asked offering Meg her elbow. Both the other Majors glared at her because they hadn't finished speaking yet.

"Just keep what I said in mind Colonel." Frank said glaring at Pierce. He muttered the word "degenerate" under his breath. As Alex and Meg walked away, Alex smirked at something.

"What are you grinning at?" Meg asked her quietly.

"Of things to come Meg, of things to come…"

A/N Okay, for the first chapter of my first MASH fic, I think that this is okay. I hope that you believe so too.

Please press the button and review?

V V V


	2. Of Colonels and Surgical Skills

Title: Cultural Differences

Author: MicroChips

Disclaimer: Don't own MASH, want to but don't…

Summary: Chapter Two: Alex talks to Hawkeye and BJ more and Meg gives Potter a revelation.

Notes: Thanks to Nertz to You, Golden Phoenix, fragmentpieces, SummerSunshine, and bluesparkle123 for reviewing, I appreciate it! I made a mistake on where the Canadian army wears its rank insignia. The insignia is actually sleeves that go on the flap on the top of the shoulders.

Chapter 2: Of Colonels and Surgical Skills.

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'Good God…How long can they stay on one subject for?' Alex thought, tapping her fingers in annoyance on the arm of her chair. She and Meg had been sitting in Colonel Potter's office for two and a half hours, only ten minutes of which had actually been used to go over Meg's and Alex's Files. Potter had made the stupid mistake of mentioning that he had served in World War II, and Meg had pounced on the opportunity to start asking questions.

After the very familiar first twenty minutes, Alex had stopped listening and had started to let her thoughts wander towards other subjects; food, drink and sleep for example. Keeping up the pretense of supposed military hierarchy had exhausted her, both mentally and physically. Her drunken escapade from the previous night was also catching up with her. She wanted nothing more than to choke down some food (powdered or otherwise), knock back a few shots of vodka, and fall onto the nearest hard cot she could find.

She must have looked like she was wandering because Potter directed a question at her.

"What do you think Major?" he asked. Alex's jumped slightly, looking more and more foolish by the second.

"Sorry sir, what do I think about what?" she asked, blinking furiously.

"War. What is your opinion on it?"

"On the record or off?"

"Which ever you prefer." Potter said. Alex heard Meg whispering "On… on" forcefully under her breath. Alex shrugged.

"Its not the nicest experience in the world." She said softly, starting to hear the thoughts that wanted to just pop out of her mouth cascade around her skull. "And I definitely believe that we could do without it in the world." Potter smiled at her as she struggled not to go on. "But it's against human nature to be at peace. We need war to be happy, whether we call it or war or not." Meg sighed obviously beside her. "And I'm gonna shut up now…" She smiled in embarrassment at Potter. He just stared at her, as if thinking what move to make next. In response Alex looked out the small window in the back corner of the room

"The shelling has stopped," she said quietly still attempting to deflect the attention from her to something else.

"Yes they have," Potter said, shuffling the files on the desk. "Well I guess that you should both get settled in."

"Sir," Meg cut in, "Can I talk to you in private for a moment?"

"Of course," Potter replied. Both Meg and Potter looked at Alex.

"I get the point…" Alex said, sighing and standing up. She saluted both Potter and Meg before turning on her heal and stalking out of the room. Meg sighed deeply, shrinking into her chair. Alex had completely worn her out.

"Your cousin is a fire cracker Colonel." Potter said smiling.

"You have no idea…" Meg grumbled back. "Please, call me Meg."

"Okay, only if you call me Sherman."

"Only if it's an order."

"It is."

"Okay, Sherman, sir." Meg smiled slightly. Potter glared at her for half a second.

"It looks like your cousin has rubbed off on you a little."

"Well, we did grow up together. She's always been this way. I just knew that she wouldn't change." Meg smiled, thinking back slightly. Potter stood up and walked over to a glass cabinet beside the window.

"Would you like a drink?" he asked.

"Sure, scotch and water if you've got some." Meg replied.

"What was it you wanted to talk to me about Meg?"

"Its about Alex- I mean Major Lexington. I've sat back in front of four previous CO's and not said a word, while they look he rover because she's a woman." She accepted the drink that Potter handed her. "As you know, there are no Canadian MASH units here, all we have is field ambulances, a dressing station and a dentists Corps. Alex and I work in one of the field ambulances, as a nursing unit. I have the pleasure to work with three of the best nurses, other than Alex, that I have ever met. I don't mind about the nursing stuff. I just have a slight problem. You see, Alex is… well… back home women are allowed to be surgeons if they can handle it…and she… um… handled it."

Radar and Alex crossed the compound, dodging the newly started (or continued) football game and (in Alex's case) the stares and whispers from the men. She had refused to let Radar take her bag, much to his confusion, and was wearing her Stetson again. Some of the men had to do a double take to make sure she was a "she" and not someone who was very familiar to them all. Radar led her to a tent, which amazingly looked like all the other tents in the compound except for the fact that it was smaller and had a sign on the front that read "VIP."

"How am I a VIP?" Alex asked with a chuckle. "I'm just a nurse."

"Nurses are important too ma'am" Radar said quietly. Alex smiled.

"Thank you Radar, you're brilliant with compliments." She said quietly. Radar smiled childishly back before opening the door to the VIP tent for her. Alex walked past him smiling slightly. It was a tent, but it was dark and quiet. Just what she wanted.

"Thank you bus boy, you'll get your tip attached to my bill." She said jokingly.

"Oh no ma'am, I don't need a tip-"

"I was kidding Radar."

"Oh okay…" Radar said, sounding confused. "Oh just to warn you, we're expecting casualties at any moment." Alex sighed.

"And the revolving door syndrome follows me…" she said quietly. Radar waited for half a second before leaving and heading back across the compound. Alex sighed and collapsed on the cot. She looked at her bag angrily before standing back up again. She opened the bag and sorted through the wad of stuff that she had thrown in there, looking for her fatigue uniform. The grayish green uniform was almost impossible to find amongst the other junk she had brought. Why on earth did she throw in a pair of skiing goggles that Meg had gotten her for a joke last Christmas? She finally had the wrinkled uniform in her hands and changed into it, still feeling like she has been run over by a bus. She quickly ran a brush through her hair and tied it back before a knock came at her door.

"Who is it?" she asked.

"Your neighbor wishing to run you out of- I mean welcome you to town." Said a slightly familiar voice. Alex sighed and opened the makeshift door. Hawkeye stood on the "door step".

"What do you want?" she asked with a smile. She leaned against the doorframe, hoping that it wouldn't cause the tent to collapse.

"Like I said, to welcome you to town." he answered.

"And how are you going to do that?" Alex asked skeptically.

"By showing you around and the like. Telling you who to avoid, though I bet you could find that out in ten seconds." Hawkeye said still grinning annoyingly. Alex frowned, debating whether or not to take up the offer.

"Okay. I'll come. But you have to promise me one thing."

"Which is?" Hawkeye asked.

"We get some take out on the way." She said with a grin. She walked completely out of the tent, letting the door crack closed behind her.

"You honestly don't want to eat here Major," Hawkeye warned, beginning to walk over towards a long tent. "This particular mess tent harbors various Kamikaze food groups, most of them in the form of powder."

"The army really goes all out with its training doesn't it?" Alex asked jokingly, making a disgusted face. Both BJ and Hawkeye snorted slightly.

"The army promised them fame and glory in the afterlife, and a Purple Heart." Alex chuckled slightly at Hawkeye's comment.

"Knowing how loony Generals are, I wouldn't put it past them…" she replied, suddenly stopping laughing.

"So where are you from Major?" Hawkeye asked in an attempt to break the silence.

"Pitt Meadows, British Columbia, Canada." Alex replied. "Not that you know where that it of course…"

"No idea. It's no where near Montreal is it?" Hawkeye asked. Alex chuckled.

"Nope. It's over by the Pacific Ocean. Where are you hailing from?"

"Crabapple Cove in Maine. You've probably never heard of it right?"

"I've heard of Maine, but not Crabapple Cove. Sounds nice though."

"It is. It's one of the best places I know."

"Wish I could say that about Pitt…" Alex said darkly.

"Why? What's wrong with it?"

"It's nothing… It's a good place, but the people are… well… something else…"

"Like?" Hawkeye pressed slightly.

"It's a farming community. Very… well the nicest way to put it would be conservative…" Alex frowned slightly. "True born rednecks going on hillbillies the majority of them. The other five are Dorothy's just wishing about what is over the rainbow… and I'm ranting aren't I…" She looked sheepishly at Hawkeye.

"Not really, you're just letting out your feelings." he paused for a few seconds, " In the form of a rant." Alex rolled her eyes.

"That's something I've got to work on." Alex mumbled, looking around. "Aren't you supposed to be showing me which very similar tent is which?" Hawkeye smirked.

"Yeah I am, unless you're really not interested of course?"

"They're all labeled… reminds me of a department store…" Alex said with a grin. "Just walking around should be enough for me to get my bearings." Hawkeye smiled back. For the next ten minutes, they wandered around the camp until once again reaching the VIP tent.

"Well, that was… Interesting to say the least." Alex said haltingly.

"And very boring to say the most?"

"Not at all."

"Stop lying Major."

"Only if you call me Alex. Major is way too… Formal." Hawkeye smiled at her.

"Okay Alex, I'll keep that in mind." He said. "Look do you want a drink?"

"Only if it's alcoholic," Alex replied.

"Is there any other kind of drink?" Hawkeye asked with a smile, turning back towards the tent called "The Swamp." Alex followed him, walking slightly behind him.

"You've got your own still?" she asked as they reached the door.

"Yeah, how can you tell?"

"One, you can smell it, two, the Officers Club is over there, three The bar is not in the camp." Alex replied as Hawkeye opened the tent door.

"Very observant of you Alex."

"I'm an observant person," Alex said softly. "Should I really be going in there for one?"

"Why do you ask?" Hawkeye asked.

"Well… I uh… I have something to do, sorry Hawkeye." Alex replied, her face going slightly pale. She turned around and walked off quickly. Frank came out of the tent, an evil grin on his face.

"Strike out again Pierce?"

"No Frank, she's petrified of ferrets." Hawkeye replied angrily.

Potter looked at her, completely dumbfounded.

"So what your saying is that, Alex is not only a nurse, she's also a-"

"Surgeon, exactly." Meg pulled a small piece of folded paper out of her pocket, unfolded it and placed it on Potters desk. "And this paper proves it." Potter examined the paper, a diploma, carefully.

"Well, its legit…"

"I'm not asking you to let her operate, just to pay attention to the fact that she's a surgeon."

"I might let her assist on some operations. She's good a pretty good grade here."

"Ninety percent. And that's with her being pushed harder than most of the men."

"Yes… Well, this certainly is different. I get told that we're getting two nurses and I get a surgeon and a nurse."

Meg smiled.

"She's a nurse first," she said quietly, finishing the glass of scotch. "Always has been and always will be."

"Well that is really interesting." Potter replied. "But a welcome interesting…" Meg smiled slightly as the PA clicked on.

"Everyone get your tango shoes ready, we've got wounded in the compound!"

"Talk about ruining a good half hour…" Meg said with a sigh.

A/N: Gah, some of this chapter is bad… I really need a beta reader… Anyone who wants the job, please say so in a review.

PS: Please leave a review!


	3. Major Problems With Majors

Title: Cultural Differences

Author: MicroChips

Disclaimer: Don't own MASH, want to but don't…

Summary: Chapter Three: Problems with Majors.

Notes: Merg sorry for taking so long… I've been busy…(bad excuse I know…)

Chapter Three: Major Problems

Alex stopped walking and sighed at the PA announcement. She didn't want to be in an operating room right now. She was quaking like a leaf from a memory that had hit her like a ton of bricks outside of the Swamp. She wrapped her arms around herself and breathed deeply in a pitiful attempt to calm down.

"Alex, are you okay?" Hawkeye asked appearing behind her. Alex turned to look at him, glaring slightly.

"Yeah I'm bloody fine," she snapped. She sighed slightly and changed her tone. "It's nothing that you can help with…" She began to walk determinedly towards the bus that had parked in the compound. Hawkeye walked beside her.

"Are you sure?"

"Yeah I'm sure… At least I think I am…" she whispered as they reached the bus. She was about to ask Hawkeye what to do, when Potter called to her from no where.

"Major Lexington, come here please," he asked; though it sounded more like an order. Alex walked over to him, feeling ever so slightly confused. When she saw Meg and how uncomfortable she looked beside the Colonel, she had to keep herself from flying off the handle at her.

"I promised you Meg…" she hissed darkly, her fists trembling.

"I didn't promise you back Major" Meg replied, taking on her best, 'I am in charge so obey me' voice. "Besides, your talents are wasted as a nurse."

"And from what I know, I agree with her Major." Potter said, backing up Meg, "I believe that you could do us a lot of good as a surgeon." Alex's jaw dropped in shock.

"What?" she finally managed to ask.

"I believe that you could do well in surgery. I want you to assist me today." Potter said with a smile. Alex chanced a small smile.

"Really?" she asked, still not quiet believing him.

"Really, really."

Alex looked at Meg, who looked back at her toes, before giving her a huge bear hug.

"I've got to love you for sticking your nose in where it isn't needed!" she said with a small laugh. It was all she could do not to cause a scene right there in the compound. Meg looked at Potter over Alex's shoulder, a relieved expression plastered all over her face. She had been expecting a completely different reaction from Alex. Gently, she pushed her cousin away.

"You go and do what you do best," she said to her softly. Alex grinned at her.

"I'll never be able to thank you for this," she said, "It's one of the-"

"Oh shut up Alex. You're being sappy."

"I'm Canadian, I'm full of sap. Maple Syrup to be precise." Alex grinned jokingly, which forced Meg to laugh.

"Go on, get going."

"Of course Colonel." Alex replied before turning to face Potter. As he led her into the Pre-Op ward, Meg stood for half a second, completely and totally stunned. Then with a smile she turned off to find Major Houlihan, who would tell her what to do… hopefully.

"How long have you been hiding that you're a surgeon Major?" Potter asked as he scrubbed his hands.

"Since we got to Korea. I wasn't allowed to join as a Doctor, so I came as a Nurse. Meg was the only one who knew that I was a surgeon. She was always pressing me to speak up about it to our CO's, but I tended to just get angry when they talked to me like I was an idiot," Alex replied scrubbing, her arms viciously. Her previous CO's had very poor places in her memory. "Not that I resent them or anything." Potter chuckled.

"With that much sarcasm, it can be safely said that you do resent them." He replied.

"Yeah, quite true…" Alex said with a grin as she shut off the tap. "Where to Mon Captain?"

"Through those doors there." Potter pointed to a set of cabaret like doors. "Don't forget a mask though."

"Should have put that on first." Alex said with a frown. She grabbed a mask off of the shelf behind her and put it on. Then she set back to washing her hands again.

"You don't have to do that."

"I feel that I do sir. It may not be completely sterile here but I can't take the risk of adding to the absence of sterility." Alex said pointedly. Potter shrugged.

"Whatever you want to do." He walked over to the doors. " Don't take too long."

"I won't." Alex replied sweetly. As the doors closed behind Potter, the ones from the outside opened.

"I wonder where that other nurse is. She was supposed to be out there…" Margaret said angrily.

"I saw her earlier Margaret, with Pierce none the less." Frank replied

"Degenerate. I can't believe that he's already after her Frank."

"But she turned him down. Left him crying on the door step she did." Alex turned off the tap with a chuckle.

"He wasn't crying, Majors." She said turning around. "He was just a bit disappointed." Both Frank and Margaret jumped slightly as they had not seen her.

"What are you doing in here Major? You were supposed to be out there helping the other nurses," Margaret said, almost like a cat pounces on its prey.

"The Colonel ordered me to come in here. Now if you'll excuse me," she pushed her way to the doors, "I've got somewhere to be" Margaret placed herself between Alex and the doors. The two of them stood glaring at each other for a moment.

"You aren't going in there. I'm not allowing you to act as a nurse in the OR if you can't do the other duties that fall to you as a nurse." Margaret hissed darkly. Alex chuckled at her, her eyes cold and angry.

"You have no authority over me, not at the moment. The Colonel asked me to act as a surgeon for today." Alex said reviling in the shock from the other two Majors.

"But, your not a surgeon, you're a nurse!" Margaret stuttered.

"Not completely true. I have a diploma stating that I am a surgeon and one stating that I am a nurse. Now if you have a problem with that Major, I suggest that you take it up with the Colonel _after_ this OR session." Alex forced her way around Margaret and walked through the doors backward as not to dirty her hands. Upon seeing their still stunned faces, she waved at them sarcastically.

"What took you so long Major?" Potter asked as she approached the table.

"Some Majorly annoying flies…"

"Burns and Houlihan?"

"How'd you guess?"

"I thought that they might have a problem with you," Potter said glancing at the nurse beside him. "Give her some gloves," he ordered. As the confused Nurse put the gloves on Alex's hands, Alex peered into the gut that Potter was bent over.

"Great… their aim gets better and better," she said darkly.

"Ours is just as good."

"They don't have hospital units so most of them die on the fields." Alex shook her head and set her mind to the task. "Anything I can do?"

"Yeah pull that bowel out of the way." Potter said. Alex obliged, ignoring the sudden heat that spread across her gloved hands. "You alright?"

"Yeah I'm used to this. Actually I'm used to no gloves at all." Alex added quietly. The doors that Alex had just come through opened again, and four people came through them.

"Frank would you stop whining!" Hawkeye said forcefully

"It gets very annoying after one whine!" BJ added angrily.

"But guys, she shouldn't be allowed in an operating room." Frank whined. Alex looked up at them and found Hawkeye staring at her. She locked eyes with him for half a second. He seemed to be frowning at her. Alex stared at him for a few seconds, ever so slightly confused.

"Major, move your fingers, they're in my way." Potter said, refocusing her attention. She swept her head around and pulled her fingers out.

"Yes sir…" she said quietly."

"What's wrong Major?"

"Nothing. Nothing at all sir."

"Well I need you to concentrate. I want to go around the heart for those fragments."

"Yeah okay…sir"

They had been in surgery for five hours when Potter started to give fifteen minutes breaks to the surgeons. He gave Alex the first one, wanting to get her out of the tense and ever so slightly angry atmosphere of the room so he could give every one else a severe dressing down.__

As she sat down rather heavily with a sigh, thoughts tumbled around her head like incessant mosquitoes of doom. It was all so monotonous. She'd give anything for a normal, rather tame, hospital ER ward any day over this glorified butcher shop. She was slowly beginning to hate this place. It wasn't the surgery. The people were beginning to get to her. They were all exceptionally cold, especially the nurses. None of them said a word more than what was needed to her. It was almost like she was a piece of crap that they had to work with but felt no need to be nice to. She sighed and leaned against the wall quietly. It didn't matter. She wasn't here to make friends or to buddy around with any one. She was here to save lives, no matter what the cost.

"Penny for your thoughts sailor?" Meg asked sitting next to her. Alex looked at her with a bemused expression.

"My thoughts are my own. If I speak them aloud, they may-"

"Fly away. Yeah I know." Meg replied with a sigh. "What did you do to get yourself so hated so fast?"

"I walked into the OR"

"That easy huh? Well you do have an effect on people." Meg braced herself for whatever retort that was coming. Alex surprised her by just sighing.

"Obviously," she replied, closing her eyes. "God I'm so tired of it all." Meg didn't say anything. She just empathetically patted Alex shoulder before remembering what she was really doing there.

"Here, I brought you some coffee. I managed to get it lukewarm."

"You're amazing Meg. I don't know what I would do without you." Alex said pulling her head off of the wall, looking for the coffee mug. Meg pressed it into her hands carefully, making sure that she actually picked it up. Alex smiled slightly as the door to Pre Op crashed open. A slightly worried looking Nurse came barrelling through the door. She looked around wildly before setting her eyes on Alex and Meg. Quickly she walked over and broke into a worried string of words and phrases.

"Hold it up, what is it?" Meg interrupted raising her hand.

The nurse took a deep breath before saying: "There's a patient in pre-op, he's haemorrhaging."

Alex sighed and closed her eyes.

"Go and get one of the surgeons then," she grumbled leaning her head against the wall. She did not want to bear the brunt of a joke from the nurses.

"I can't ma'am. They're all busy with patients." The nurse replied. Alex looked at her critically. She couldn't have been older than twenty-eight. Alex slowly turned to look at Meg.

"Go and get an instrument tray and a pair of gloves," she said to her cousin with a sigh. She turned back to the nurse. "Are there any free anaesthesia tanks in there?"

"No ma'am, no tables either." The nurse replied, moving as Meg walked quickly past her. Alex frowned and stood up.

"We'll have to settle with either then. Get a mask and some Ether quickly," she ordered before stalking into the Pre-Op room. There was only one gurney in the room, and it was being crowded around by at least ten nurses, all working furiously to stop the bleeding and get the man to remain still. Alex could tell by the words coming out of his mouth that he was Korean. The nurse walked timidly over to one of the other nurses at the table and said something to her. She spun around and stared at Alex. The stare remained for half a second before it changed into a glare.

"You!" she snarled. Alex sighed as she recognized the nurse as Major Houlihan.

"Yes me. You called?" Alex replied, trying to remain calm.

"I asked for a surgeon, not a nurse." Margaret snapped at the nurse.

"And she got one, _Major,_" Alex spat as if the phrase was as disgusting as the war. "Everyone else is busy." Margaret looked as if she was going to snap back at her before resorting to an attempt to stare her down. The room went silent for half a second as the two Majors stared at each other. Meg chose that exact moment to hurry through the doors into the room. She looked between Alex and Margaret for half a second.

"What on Earth is going on here?" she asked her voice going very soft. "You are supposed to be saving this man's life, not glaring at each other. Get on with it! That's an order!" Alex broke eye contact with Margaret to look at Meg. Her eyes looked almost black and her jaw was trembling in anger. Margaret looked as if she was about to respond before saluting and turning back to the patient.

"I'll talk to you later Alex," Meg snarled quietly. "That was the worst display of stupidity that I have ever seen!" She turned on her heel and stalked over to the huddle of nurses. Alex slowly followed. The huddle parted to let her in. She hissed through her teeth upon seeing the extent of the damage done to the man.

"Why isn't he already in there?" she asked as Meg elbowed her to put some gloves on.

"He's a North Korean." Margaret replied huffily. Alex looked at her as if she were insane. She sharply gestured towards the blood that was oozing out of his stomach.

"See that? See the blood? That's the only thing that matters Major, not what uniform is getting covered by it," she hissed. The Korean snarled something at her and sat up slightly. Alex gave him the sharpest look she could.

"Same to you…" she mumbled. One of the nurses placed an ether mask over his face and, before he could retaliate managed to give him enough to get him under. Alex looked around the group of nurses. Most of them had backed away, excluding Meg and Margaret. Alex looked at them and received a small nod from Meg.

"Well everybody, lets do the Michigan Rag," she muttered. "Scalpel."

Two and a half-hours, thirteen clamps and ten units of B negative blood later….

It was silent, dead silent.

It wasn't there. Where had it gone? 

She couldn't hear. Maybe it was shock? No, shock didn't do this to you

It wasn't there.

What was it?

Where had it gone? It had run away.

Adrenaline hadn't helped.

"Adrenaline, quick. Bag him, someone bag him damn it."

It died… it was so easy to take away.

No don't tell me he has no pulse or pressure.

Only four stiches.

I only had four more stitches to go.

The scalpel wasn't worth it.

Scalpel. I need to get to the heart. No don't you tell me it isn't worth it.

He can't die, not yet.

The blood hadn't helped.

What about all the extra blood we pumped into him? Why didn't that help?

So much does so little.

"Alex snap out of it for Peters sake!" Meg snapped. Alex slowly looked at Meg an angry look on her face.

"The scalpel will work," she said quietly.

"It's been too long." Meg replied. Alex looked at her as if she was an idiot before turning back to the Korean on the table. She was right. It wouldn't help now. Alex frowned and took off her robe and draped it over the Korean. Her frown deepened as she pulled off her gloves.

"Damn." She mumbled before turning and walking out of the room. She walked back into the annexing room and found her coffee, still on the bench. She sat down slowly and picked it up to sip it. It was cold. She didn't care that it was cold. It was still caffeine. The door she had just come through opened and Meg wandered over to her.

"It wasn't your fault Alex," she said quietly. Alex made a noncommittal grunt in reply. Meg sighed.

"It's gonna be a drink for every minute that she worked on him later…" she muttered to herself before wandering off back towards the OR. She looked in the door before turning back to Alex.

"They want you in there," she observed carefully. Alex placed the coffee cup down again and stood up.

"Then me they'll get," she muttered, walking past Meg and into the OR again.

"Where on Earth have you been, _Doctor?_" Frank asked evilly. Alex glared at him and opened her mouth to reply.

"Oh go and shove it in your ear Major!" Margaret snarled at him. She had already come back into the OR halfway through the operation that Alex had been performing. Alex looked at her and smiled. Margaret paid no attention, but Alex could tell that she was grinning slightly. Meg wandered over to her with a new robe and a new gown.

"Anyone need an extra pair of hands?" Alex asked with a slightly more airy sound in her voice as Meg did up the robe at the back.

"As if anyone would need help from you. I bet you can't even cut a straight line with a scalpel!" Frank added an annoying chuckle at the end of his sentence.

"Neither can you Frank." Hawkeye replied off-handedly. "You can help me Alex." She wandered over to him and took a look at what he was doing.

"You don't need any help with that," she said softly. "It's only a flesh wound."

"Well take it as an excuse to talk to you." Hawkeye replied.

"Right…" Alex replied rolling her eyes and smirking. Hawkeye grinned, but kept his face turned away so Alex couldn't see it.

"What are you doing after this?" he asked after a few minutes.

"After what in particular? After this day? After this week? After the war?"

"After this session."

"Umm… no idea why?" Alex asked, glancing at him warily. Hawkeye looked up at her.

"I was wondering if you wanted to come and get a drink with me?" he said quietly. Alex had tensed slightly while she had asked the question.

"Um, I'm not sure. Only if you want to get drunk under the table." Alex said softly, obviously nervous.

"You making that a challenge?"

"Yeah I am."

"Good you're on." Hawkeye said loudly. "Dueling pistols at ten paces. If I had a clean glove I'd slap you with it."

"But that would be very unproductive…" Alex mumbled. "I have no aim…"

"That's okay I have no gun tolerance."

"Could you two pipe down? Some of us are trying to work." Frank snarled.

"Of course Frank. The rest of us will just go and play golf elsewhere shall we?" Hawkeye replied.

"You must really think that your funny Pierce but I don't see anyone else laughing."

"That's because we're all wearing masks Major." Alex observed carefully. Frank made a noise that was a cross between a snarl and a person choking, but did not respond. Everyone in the room went quiet and Alex could pick up on Meg's plots for destroying her halfway across the room.

"Wow, you're all such a great crowd. I'll be here all week." Alex murmured sarcastically, quickly attempting to set her mind back to the task at hand.

With a yawn, a few groans, and even more curses directed towards the army and/or the war, the surgical staff of the four-oh-double lucky number stumbled out into the compound of the MASH. They quickly dissipated off to their tents or where ever else they were headed. Meg and Alex were the last ones to leave. They were as silent as the war was loud, not wanting to talk. Meg slipped her hand into Alex's and gripped it tightly.

"You alright?" she asked carefully. Alex sighed deeply.

"Yeah I guess." Alex frowned slightly. "No it isn't… But it's nothing getting absolutely plastered won't fix." Now it was Meg's turn to sigh.

"You rely far too much on the fire water Alex," she said licking her teeth, giving her voice a very gummy sound to it. Alex chuckled slightly.

"You sound just like old Father Averwight back home."

"I try my dear child, Meg said pulling her lips over her teeth to distort her voice even more. "I do try. Trying is better than… What were we talking about?" With that they both fell into peals of laughter, and tried desperately not to fall to their knees. They received a few nasty looks, most of which were leaden with tiredness, before someone wandered over to shut them up.

"You two should conduct yourselves like officers…" Frank snapped, bursting their happy bubble. Alex immediately stopped laughing and turned around rapidly.

"Officer? Where?!" she said loudly, causing Meg to chuckle again. Frank snorted at them angrily.

"Just because you're from an allied country doesn't mean you can act like you're at ease here," he growled. Meg stopped laughing. She knew that it was directed at Alex mostly, but he was starting to get under her skin.

"I suggest you watch it Major, or you'll be on report," she snarled.

"You can't do that…" Frank replied, not sounding all too sure of himself.

"See these?" Meg asked pointing to the stripes on her shoulder. "These give me the right to do it." She glared at Frank for a few moments before he swallowed sharply and stalked off. Alex raised her eyebrows at Meg.

"Wow, Meg… you really are scary as an officer," she said quietly. "Never act like one again in my presence."

"I won't, Alex, I won't." Meg replied. "Now, where is this officers club? I could do with a drink or ten now."

As they walked into the officers club, they blinked slightly.

"Well, it's no downtown bar, but it'll have to do." Alex said, her eyes already focused on the bar. She made a beeline straight towards it.

"What can I do you for?" the private behind the bar asked her.

"A vodka and a scotch please." Alex ordered. The private looked at her for half a second before his eyes drifted to her shoulder.

"Um, we don't have any vodka ma'am," he said quietly. Alex sighed slightly.

"Well, a gin then. No use asking if you have any tonic right?" the private looked shocked. "Thought not." Alex frowned slightly and turned to look around the club. She couldn't think straight any more. Anything that even reminded her of red got lodged in her mind along with nearly everything else. She couldn't help notice that a few nurses were sitting in the corner and continuously looking over at her. Meg elbowed her in the stomach gently and she turned to look at her.

"Can I borrow some money?" she asked. Alex sighed and closed her eyes.

"Of course I'd forget that," she said angrily.

"Here I've got it. How much was it?" someone said beside her. Alex turned her head to see Hawkeye standing beside her. He winked slightly and handed the private a couple of scrip dollars.

"Thanks." Alex said with a slight smile.

"It's no problem. You want to come and sit down?"

"Sure." Alex looked around for Meg, but she had disappeared with her drink over to the nurses. Alex sighed and followed Hawkeye to a table across the room. They sat down and sipped their drinks for a few moments in silence.

"I heard what happened in pre-op today." Hawkeye began cautiously.

"So?" Alex said darkly.

"You tried your best and shouldn't let it get to you." Hawkeye sipped his drink. "Besides, there was nothing you could do."

"I've helped people on the field hurt worse than that." Alex snarled slightly, taking a vicious sip of gin. "How did you find out?

"I over heard Margaret telling Frank."

"Oh great, now the whole camp knows!"

"Only the officers. They refuse to talk to the enlisted men."

"Snobbish gits…" Alex grumbled darkly. "Who gives them the right?"

"They do. They made a bad impression on you I see?"

"Obviously. Is murder a crime in Korea?"

"Probably. Not that anyone cares at the moment. There is far too much murder going on here. We see the lucky ones." Hawkeye took an angry gulp of his beer. Alex was silent for a few seconds before downing the rest of her gin. She stared at the empty glass for a few seconds before standing up.

"I'd better get going. I've got some things to think about, sleep to catch up on, stuff like that," she announced to Hawkeye.

"Do you want me to walk you back?" he asked genuinely interested.

"No thanks. I'm not going to get attacked walking across a compound," Alex chuckled sarcastically, the frown deepening slightly. She quickly walked out of the officers club, leaving Hawkeye to wonder if he was really that repulsive.

A/N: Hilo, just responding to my reviews! =3

BlueSparkle123: Thanks for the double post, lol. Anyway, I don't know about tension… maybe just enough so that you can cut it with a knife maybe…

soccerchick4563: Just to let you know, I'm not insane… Often…. puts up a sock puppet that looks like a raccoon and pretends to make it talk.

R: That's not true.

MC: Yes it is… be quiet you rodent.

R: Ferret.

MC: I'll call you a ferret if you want…

R: No thanks…

MC: I thought not

Romancer 4-Eva: Thank you for being my beta and sticking up with me being painful through this chapter. Also, on the point of you being able to read ahead of time, shhhh the others don't know that…. Lol

Mergh, sorry for taking so long, the writers block, it's a killer. But I've already started the next chapter, so hopefully it wont be too long…


	4. Threats and Swamp Monsters

Title: Cultural Differences

Author: MicroChips

Disclaimer: See chapter 1

Notes: I'm so sorry for being so long with this chapter, my comp crashed and then I broke my foot. Some severe swearing in this chapter… I'm just glad that I don't have to change the rating… well hopefully.

Chapter 4:Threats and Swamp Monsters

It had to be about four am and Alex had not yet slept a wink. She lay on her back in her tent, softly humming a song to herself, staring at the drab olive ceiling. She was used to this. She had suffered from mild insomnia since she was five, and it had become a lot worse when she had come over to Korea.

She yawned and rolled over to stare blankly at the wall. Inside her mind she ran over the events of the previous day. She felt so tense and could not figure out why. She should feel safer not being out in the field, yet this sensation of impending doom crept over her. With a snort, she stood up and stalked outside. She needed to do something to take her mind off this feeling.

Without a sound, she lay down in front of her door and looked up at the sky, calmly staring at the stars. As a child she remembered her father and brother had stared for hours at the skies, whether through telescopes or just with their eyes just to see what they could. Alex's eyes swam slightly as she thought of those days. They were long gone and no longer needed.

She sniffed sharply and stood up before walking around the compound. Insomnia was not a new experience. She had suffered from it since she was a child. Ever since her father…

_No, that was not what happened, you have no idea what happened, you weren't there! _She chided herself viciously. She shook her head and continued to walk. After about half an hour of wandering around the camp, an announcement over the PA woke her from her thoughts.

_"Rise and shine! It's five in the am and we got customers!"_

She threw her head back and stretched slightly. Well, it was a good way to kill time before dawn.

_(Attempted Break)_

Meg crept up on her a good while later and demanded to know where she had gone the previous evening.

"Away," Alex replied simply, angry at Meg's interruption. She was playing a very dangerous game of tag with a bullet in a Corporals chest. Meg frowned slightly at the dark circles under Alex's eyes.

"Did you get any sleep?"

"What's that?" Alex asked, blinking slightly. She grinned as she finally got a good grip on the bullet and pulled it out. "I need some 3-0 silk."

"3-0 silk," the nurse who was assisting her said, handing her the threaded needle. Alex blinked and began the slightly tedious task of stitching the Corporal up.

"Alex, you need to see someone about your sleeping problems," Meg said in a worried voice. Alex sighed sharply and almost dropped a stitch.

"I don't need to do anything. You on the other hand need to mind your own bees-wax," she snapped sharply. Meg blinked for a moment at Alex's viciousness. She very rarely yelled at anything, well anything important to her.

"Okay, I'll leave you alone then," she said before stalking off.

"Good, you got the point…" Alex grumbled, finishing her grisly sewing. "Corpsman, get this guy to post op." She stretched for a moment while blinking ever so slightly. She had been ignoring the banter from the other doctors for the majority of the time she had been in the OR. Hawkeye had just called Frank some sort of rodent and the Major was busy arguing the finer points of general etiquette between officers.

"You show no respect to people of higher rank to you Pierce!" Frank snapped with a small whine.

"I do show respect to people of higher rank. I just have to plug my nose before I do it," Hawkeye replied, receiving a few chuckles from the staff. Alex grinned to herself as another solider was placed on the table in front of her. Her smile faded quickly as she saw the damage that was done to him. She turned to the corpsmen who brought him in.

"Did they bring a leg with them?" she asked as calmly as she could. The corpsmen shook their heads and quietly walked off. Alex gulped sharply and looked over at the nurse across from her.

"Saline solution," Alex ordered, her voice wavering slightly behind the commanding tone. As the nurse passed her the bottle, Alex couldn't stop her hand from trembling slightly. She forced herself to stop trembling quickly, but not before the nurse had picked it up.

"Are you okay Major?" she asked quietly.

"Yes… I'm-" Alex managed to say before Meg stalked up again.

"Thank you Lieutenant, I'll assist the Major with this one," she ordered sharply. As the lieutenant left, she shot a glance at Alex's pale face, not knowing what to do or say.

"Thanks…" Alex whispered weakly as Meg pried the saline from her hand.

"What are cousins for?" Meg asked with a consoling grin. She proceeded to irrigate the wound for Alex, letting her cousin prepare herself for what had to be done next. Franks eyes narrowed as he caught this exchange. Oh where could he take this one?

_(Another Attempted Break)_

As they all walked out of the OR like zombies, Meg and Alex headed straight for the mess tent. They were both extremely tired and did not notice that Frank and Hawkeye were tailing them closely. They stood in line, Alex not really wanting to eat but being forced by Meg to do just that. Alex looked extremely ill, and deeply pale under her red hair. Meg had to force a bowl of oatmeal into her hands and steer her to a vacant table before she would respond. As Meg forced her to sit down, Alex grimaced at the food.

"What is this?" she asked, pulling a spoonful of grey gunk out of the bowl and letting it flop back in.

"It's a bad imitation of oatmeal…" Meg grumbled, sniffing her spoonful before wincing.

"This is oatmeal? Looks like dead skin…" Alex said, raising her voice slightly.

"Probably is… I bet they cooked it in really dirty socks…" Meg grinned at her and also raised her voice.

"Kill two birds with one stone?" Alex asked, putting theatrical emotion into her voice.

"Wouldn't put it past them. Army cooking is pretty bad," she lowered her voice and looked conspiratorially at Alex. "I think we should stop. They have all paled significantly." Alex just grinned and took a small mouthful of the goop.

"Fine. Ruin my fun why don't you?" she flared her nostrils as the taste took hold of her and made a small gacking noise. She slowly pushed the bowl away as someone sat down next to her. She slowly turned her head and glared at Hawkeye, who had a consoling smile on his face. Alex sighed and rolled her eyes.

"You saw didn't you?"

"Yes I did. Do you want to-"

"Talk about it? Hell no," Alex snapped angrily, brushing a strand of hair angrily off her face. "What happened is my business and mine alone." She viciously pushed the oatmeal substitute around the bowl before sighing angrily and standing.

"I think I'll go back to bed," she declared sullenly before turning and walking off. She suddenly looked very tired. Meg nodded solemnly as Hawkeye dropped his jaw.

"What was that all about?" he asked, a dumbfounded expression on his face. Meg shook her head and followed Alex's retreating form with her eyes.

"Reasons best known to Alex and me for now," she hissed darkly through her teeth before adding, "I'll tell you later." She shot up off of the bench and stalked quickly over to where Alex had just been cornered by Frank.

"I do hope you have an explanation for your actions today Major," He said smarmily. Alex flashed him an all too cheesy smile.

"An explanation? For what?" she raised her eyebrows and cocked her head to one side as she asked the question, not too dissimilar than an inquisitive child.

"For that stunt you pulled in the OR. Letting a nurse do most of an operation. If I didn't know any better I'd say you had no skills," Frank stated slightly louder than needed. A crowd had begun to pay attention to what was going on. Alex blinked and her smile turned cold.

"I do suggest that you take that back, Major Burns, or I shall be forced to make you."

"Are you making a threat to an officer?" Frank raised his eyebrows and flared his nostrils. He did not notice Alex's hands were white from being clenched so tightly.

"No, I'm threatening an inferior human being," she hissed coldly. Meg finally managed to force her way through the crowd and gripped Alex's shoulder tightly.

"Majors, is there a problem here?" she asked, her voice not giving away what she was feeling.

"No I don't believe there is." Alex said sharply before spinning on her heel and attempting to force her way through the crowd. Frank scoffed.

"Obviously you can't prove that you are a superior surgeon, Major Lexington. How did you get that rank anyway? Your family buy it for you?" Frank barely had time to finish his gloating before Alex had turned around and tackled him to the floor. She landed at least two punches on him before various people pulled her off of him.

"You goddamned yank!" she screeched as the people holding onto her received bites kicks and scratches. "You good for nothing ass hole! You couldn't see anything if it wasn't taped to the end of your shitty nose! You fucking spineless, yellow bellied, tit whore!" she continued as people dragged her out of the mess tent. They let her go halfway across the camp, and she was still reeling off various objectionable phrases in at least three different languages.

"Tete du merde! Tu putain ta mere!" she finally ended, out of breath and throat feeling like it had been rubbed with sandpaper. She drew in a breath through her teeth that sounded like a large hiss. Without looking at the people who had pulled her out of the tent, she turned and stormed of and locked herself in the VIP tent. Meg sighed as she stormed off and seriously considered screaming into her hands. She balled her fists and stormed back to the mess tent. Frank was whining on one of the benches, Margaret coddling him like an infant.

"And then she hit me! Why does everyone want to hit me?" Frank whined pathetically.

"Because you provoke them to an extent of which it's the only course of action!" Meg snarled at him, advancing viciously. Frank paled considerably as she spoke while Margaret stood up and glared at her.

"How did he provoke her?" she demanded. Meg looked back at her with almost double the intensity.

"Alex's family is a very touchy subject," she said coldly, "and do remember that you are speaking to a superior officer, Major…" She pushed past Margaret and stopped in front of Frank.

"Be happy, Major Burns, that you are not a member of the Canadian Army," she said simply before turning and leaving the mess tent. As soon as she was gone from hearing range, Frank let out a quiet whimper of fear and passed out.

_(Yet another time/ place break)_

Alex lay on her cot and fumed. Her fists clenching and unclenching, occasionally tight enough to almost cut her skin with her extremely short fingernails. She was muttering under her breath, about the army, majors, and various other subjects of what those two things should go and do, normally involving shoving heads up each other and so on. She didn't even notice a quiet knocking at the door until the knock became much more insistent.

"What do you want?" she snapped at the door. It opened cautiously, and Hawkeye came in wearing a bucket on his head and carrying a mop like a sword.

"It's safe, there appears to be no hostile activity," he waved his hand and continued to stalk into the tent. Meg followed him with a very flustered expression on her face, and she was followed by BJ, who was also decked out in the same ensemble as Hawkeye.

"What the hell are you two up to?" Alex asked, swinging her legs off of the cot so she was in a sitting position. BJ let out a loud and very comical shriek, while jabbing the stick end of the mop at Alex.

"Look out! They've sent out the great and terrible swamp monster!" he exclaimed, while Hawkeye swung around and made the same stabbing motion with the broom he held. Alex's glare could have melted steel, and if it hadn't the tone of her voice that followed would surely rip its atoms apart.

"Get out…" she snarled angrily. All the intruders felt a shiver run up their spine.

"I um… think that…" Meg said quietly before trotting quickly out the door. Both Hawkeye and BJ followed her and did not give Alex a reason for lobbing a boot at them. She collapsed back onto her cot and proceeded to cry herself to sleep.

_(Yet another one…)_

"What's up with her?" Hawkeye asked Meg as they crossed the compound. Meg looked at him dejectedly then looked around them to see who was there.

"Stuff I can't tell you in public, though it would probably be best if someone around here knew…" Meg mumbled quietly. She wrung her hands nervously and shuffled from foot to foot. "She may need it if she does what get us sent down here in the first place."

A/N: I do apologize for not posting in a while. Please, no rotten fruit, it's a killer.

**Bluesparkle123: Once again, glad you liked it. If I told you my plans for Alex, wouldn't that mean that you know more than everyone else? _Laughs_ I'm not promising anything. But maybe.**

**Akahana: Thank you, I feel loved.**

**Evila-elf: When I read the fist part fo your review I thought, oh god my first flame, but then I read further. Thank you, and I'm glad you liked it. About the nationality thingy, I was emphasizing that there was a lot of prejudice in that war but yeah; it was a bit too harsh…**

**Oliver: I'm glad that you liked it. Megumi is a very Japanese name but I did my research on this one. Meg and Alex are from British Columbia, to be more precise, Vancouver. During the time between the First and Second World War, a lot of Japanese people settled in Vancouver. During WW2 they were persecuted quite badly. They were sent to prison camps and had all their property taken from them (wow in Canada?!?!?!). A large amount of them stayed in BC after the war, and a majority of them still live in BC today. Yes, it sounds a bit funny, but believe me, its possible.**

Well thanks to all my reviewers. I think that I will give you all a Krispy Kreme doughnut. Tim Hortons invades the states, Krispy Kreme invades ehre.


	5. Air Raids and Snipers

Title: Cultural Differences

Author: MicroChips

Disclaimer: I don't own MASH.

Notes: I'm back, after almost a year of absence. I'm so sorry guys, I apologize greatly. Life's been, well hellish recently. This chapter is very important to the rest of the story. It is also very, _very_ gory. You have been warned.

Chapter 5: Air Raids and Snipers

Meg slowly turned the half empty martini glass that she held and let out a shuddering sigh as she turned her eyes to Hawkeye and BJ.

"You have to understand that telling you this feels almost like a betrayal for me. Alex made me promise that under no circumstances was I to speak of these events to anyone, but I feel that they are affecting her more than she is letting on. Don't ask me why I'm telling you two, I really don't know. I think that you seem trustworthy, though I seem to think that anyone who gives me a free drink is trustworthy," she chuckled nervously and twitched slightly before taking another gulp of the gin.

"Alex was born to her parents Jay and Maria on August 7th 1922, and was the second of their two children. Her older brother Jason was born four years earlier just after the end of the Great War. They lived a pretty happy life with our family nearby. My father and Alex's father were twin brothers, and never went very far from each other. In 1939, when the second war broke out, My father, both of Alex's parents, and her brother went over to war. Alex came to stay with my mother and myself.

"Three weeks into it, a bomb was dropped on one of the medical bunkers. Both of Alex's parents were in it.

"Maria died in the explosion, Jay lost his leg and was sent back home,"

"Is that why she reacted how she did earlier?" Hawkeye asked. Meg smiled sadly and shook her head.

"That's part of it but not all. A lot took place afterwards. He managed to get a prosthetic limb before," she frowned slightly, "drowning his sorrows. To say that he was a mean drunk would be an insult to their kind. Vicious, vindictive, even sadistic suits him much better. He'd beat her, spit on her, kick her, verbally torture her. And she just took it. I don't know how she did, but she just took it."

There was dead silence in the tent for about ten seconds before Meg took a shuddering breath and continued.

"I stayed away from that house for two years. I just didn't know what to do. It was such a huge mistake. Alex eventually turned up on my mothers doorstep with a broken nose, three broken ribs and a cracked sternum. I don't know how she managed to sleep at night," Meg shook her head slightly. "Her brother eventually found out and quit his job to come home and "fix" his father.

"Alex has never gone back to that house, and I can't say that I blame her. She enrolled in University as soon as her face healed, and forced her way through there. When that was done she managed to make enough to stay away from her father forever." Meg shrugged slightly and turned her eyes to the floor. Both Hawkeye and BJ had the sense that she was finished.

"But if all this is tied to a war in some way, why is she here of all places?" Hawkeye asked. Meg smiled at him carefully and looked highly unlikely to continue. She was silent for a few moments as her expression changed to one of sad recollection.

"That's the big question isn't it?" she asked herself out loud. She looked away from them both before taking a deep breath. "It's a very long story..."

-+-+-

He trudged along the path, this green eyes bland and tired. Every bone in his body ached from the long march that he had subjected himself to. The heavy bag strapped to his back seemed to push him forward with more determination than he had left in himself. He couldn't stop though, no matter how tired he became. It was his duty to keep going, to make sure that the three people behind him got to where they were going. Then he could rest.

He stared up the path, angry at how it looked the exact same as it had not ten minutes before. Dust and rocks and scrub; all that he had seen for almost twenty four hours. Though it could have been worse, they could have come across Koreans.

He let out a wry chuckle at that thought, wondering for a moment if the heat was addling his brains. He had been needing a drink for well over a day, but hadn't stopped to drink. He certainly felt rather insane as he kept hearing someone call "Lieutenant," over and over. He shook his head sharply, sending a large chunk of flame red hair into his eyes.

Somehow this small action pulled him from his reverie. He stood up straight suddenly as a hand was placed on his shoulder and whipped around to face the culprit. A younger man stared back at him through grime and mud, his pale blue eyes twinkling urgently.

"Are you alright lieutenant?" he asked softly, an expression of worry filtering its way through the gunk on his face. The lieutenant looked at him with an expression of confusion for a mere moment, as if trying to place who the other man was. He was carrying a rifle over his shoulder and a bag similar to the one the lieutenant carried. His uniform was similar too, though he wore the single bar of a private and it was coated in a dark red stain. For a moment the lieutenant wondered if the other man had been eating cranberry sauce with the skill of a toddler, but blanched as he remembered the real reason.

"Yeah, Zander. I'm fine," he responded, using the private's nickname rather than his rank. Exhaustion seemed to have taken all authority from his voice. "How's Soup doing?"

"Not so good sir. Doc say's that he's leaking more blood than a-"

"Whatever metaphor Doc used, I'm sure that it is not a good one," the private and lieutenant shared a small smile before both turned to look at the other two men of the company. One was holding a makeshift bier and the other was unconscious on top of it. The lieutenant's smile faded quickly as he turned back to the private.

"How long does he have?"

"Not long enough to get to one of our units."

"Which is the closest?"

"There's a MASH not ten minutes away," the private pointed at the hill beside them. "In that direction."

"Any minefields?"

"Not sure, we haven't been this way for a while."

The lieutenant sighed. "Well, at last pass were there any minefields?"

"I think that they were planning on clearing it out," the private frowned. "But it's highly unlikely that they did. A MASH is not exactly a tactical position."

"And since when do they do anything that they say they are going to?" the lieutenant replied with a chuckle. The private force a smile onto his face, but did not hold it for long. He could guess what the lieutenant was planning.

"How long to get there?"

"Ten around the hill, three over it, but we have to take into account that the hill is a potential minefield," the private replied, practically watching the wheels turn in the lieutenants head. The lieutenant turned to the man on the bier and sighed before looking back up the hill. He had to think about all of his men, not just the wounded corporal.

"Double time it around the hill," he ordered, a bitter taste crawling up into his mouth. "Maybe we'll get lucky and there will be a jeep on the road." The private paled, but saluted nonetheless before going back to the other two men and relayed the order. The lieutenant shook his head and hunched over once more before going off at a double time march. Once again he questioned his sanity, as he had done since his arrival in hell.

"So let me get this straight," Hawkeye began after a few moments of silence. Meg smiled benignly at him, knowing fully well that she had completely unnerved the doctor. His confused expression had deepened throughout her story. "You're here to look for your fiancé-"

"Who disappeared, yes," Meg's eyes flashed with amusement.

"And Alex came to make sure that you didn't do anything stupid?"

"Exactly," she answered simply, standing up as if to leave. "But now that you know practically all my cousin's past and a small part of mine, I must go and make sure that she hasn't killed anyone while I have been sat here drinking this," she glanced at the martini glass that Hawkeye had just taken from her, "imitation of booze..."

With that, she turned and walked out of the tent, leaving a very astonished Hawkeye and BJ to their own devices.

"I can't believe it," BJ said after a few moments, an extremely contemplative look on his face.

"I know," Hawkeye replied, more angry than anything else. "I can't believe that she called out gin imitation!" With that, he slammed the martini glass back beside the still and threw himself back on his cot.

Meg smiled blandly to herself as she crossed the compound to Alex's tent, feeling more and more disgusted with herself as she did so. She had just spilled everything that made Alex who she was to a pair of complete strangers. This was why she hated alcohol so damned much. It always drove her to do or say stupid things.

Meg shook her head angrily as she knocked on the door tot he VIP tent. Alex didn't answer her. For a moment it occurred to Meg that she would have to tell Alex what had just happened, yet if she did Alex would be rather unpredictable. Her anger at Frank would not have subsided just yet, and for that very reason Meg came to the conclusion that she would have to remain silent.

She knocked again, more forcefully this time, as Alex had not answered. She had a nasty habit of sulking, which Meg thought was rather unbecoming for a twenty eight year old.

"Alex, open the damned door!" she ordered forcefully, placing her hands on her hips and assuming a posture of condescendence. For a moment there was complete silence before someone moved around from the side of the tent.

"Your observation skills need work Meg," Alex said, poking her head around the canvas. She blinked once at her cousin and smirked before leaning back against the wall off the tent. Meg frowned at her and walked around the tent, noting that Alex was wearing her black toque on her head.

"Yeah well, I need to work on my observation skills, you need your personal skills working on."

"Ha ha. Got me there," Alex replied flatly, keeping her eyes pinned on the compound rather than meeting Meg's eyes. "I do need to work on communicating with our species." She blinked once before glancing at Meg's shoes then turning back to the compound. "But I refuse to speak with Ferrets."

Meg rolled her eyes, but Alex kept on talking.

"My incredibly devious mind has kicked in and decided that I need to get revenge for that situation."

"Punching his face in not enough?"

"On no, violence is never enough. Pranking is the only way to deal with it now..." Meg shuddered. This was going to get nasty. "You see what I have planned is-"

She didn't have time to announce what her plans were, as a large amount of people hurried past towards the entrance to the compound.

"What the hell?" Meg asked, her eyes locking onto Alex's before the two of them sped off after the crowd. From what they could see a small group of people were collapsed at the entrance, from exhaustion or some other reason. As they approached, Alex felt a gnawing sensation start in her stomach. These were Canadian uniforms. She twitched even more, seeing the rifles that they were carrying.

Sniper rifles.

-+-+-

The lieutenant fell to his knees three feet short of the MASH sign, exhaustion claiming him finally. Barely two feet behind him, the three other men of his company found their way to the ground, relieved that they had gotten there in time. They to collapsed into silence, glad to be where they were.

But for the poor lieutenant, the silence was not to last. The vibrations of feet through the ground pulled him groggily from his silent sleep, and the heavy mumbled voices caused him to protest forcefully. He flailed one arm up and around, smacking someone with a lot less force than he thought he had done.

"Someone get him sedated!" shouted a voice. Someone turned him over so that the sun was in his eyes, blinding him.

"He's exhausted, probably petrified," said another voice. He frowned slightly, the accent had been vaguely familiar. He opened his mouth to speak but all that came out was a garbled mess.

"Soup, help, shot, blood."

Someone blocked out the sun with their head, causing the lieutenant to frown as his eyes adjusted once more tot he change in light.

"He's fine, they've got a doctor looking at him now. What I want from you Jason, is an explanation as to why you left this shoulder wound untended for so long?" she asked. Jason's frown intensified. Her voice was so damned familiar.

"Who are you?" he managed to croak out.

"What, you don't recognize your own sister!" she asked. The lieutenant started slightly, Alex's green eyes flashing with mirth.

"Alex?" he asked incredulously. "But I thought-"

"That I was at home hiding with Meg? No such luck Jason." she turned her head away and glanced at something just out of his vision. "Look I have to go and help out with Corporal Campbell. One of the other doctors will be right over to help you." With that she was gone, disappearing off into the sun with barely a sound. Jason could feel something crawling up into his head, fogging over his senses and slowly drowning him in sleep.

-+-+-

Waking was not a pleasant thing in Korea, but doing so to the stabbing pain in the back of one's head made it twice as intolerable. So it was for Second Lieutenant Jason Lexington as he opened his eyes briefly. A stabbing sensation just above the base of his skull caused him to wince his eyes shut immediately, yet a small amount of detail burned into his brain. He had seen light from a window above him, seen a window across from him; he knew that there was as little as two ambulatory people in the room. His every bone ached, every muscle screamed. There was something horribly wrong with him.

Attempting not to groan or attract attention, he raised his head half an inch, opened his eyes slightly, and looked around the room. There were twenty or so beds in the small makeshift room, each one filled with injured men, the majority of which were unconscious. The people he had seen moving before were in fact women, more importantly nurses; each wearing American uniforms. He let out a sigh of relief before dropping his head back to the pillow and fully opening his eyes. The dull ache that had been in the base of his skull was now spreading around to his eyes, making them water slightly.

He was beginning to have difficulty focusing on the ceiling when a cup was thrust across his vision.

"You need to drink," snapped a woman. Jason had to resist the urge to jump up defensively, as he had not seen her before. "You managed to make yourself so dehydrated that you would have died were you any further away from here."

He reached up and took the glass before letting her help him up into a sitting position and looking at her face.

"Alex, you're a life saver," he croaked, his throat unwilling to respond to his need for communication.

"I know, it's my job," she frowned at him slightly, "Now, drink. If you don't I'll-"

"Make me eat dirt?" Jason chuckled after taking a sip of the water.

"Yeah, though that would have to wait until you had recovered a bit." Alex smiled slightly. "I'm glad that you're alright."

"I'm a survivor eh? I'd survive no matter what."

"Sure, I suppose you would," Alex's smile faded slightly. "Your men came out fine."

"Even Soup?"

"Corporal Campbell will have to go home, but yes, he's fine. One of the best doctors here worked on him." Alex looked away slightly, staring at some point far away. Jason frowned at this, expecting her to have been a lot more lively than she was.

"What's wrong Alex?"

"I'm tired is all," she turned back to him with a forced smile before standing up. "You drink that and get some sleep, eh? I'll be back for duty at oh-one-hundred hours." With that she took off out the door, leaving Jason slightly mystified as to her actions. His sister had always done that to him though, ever since she had been little. Once she had asked for his help with her chores, only so that she could do his. Alex's had entailed doing the laundry and washing some dishes, while Jason's had entailed some large amounts of repair work around the house. At the time he had been unable to use one of his hands, having accidentally sliced it open when working in a saw mill. She had only done it as a favor to him, even though at the time she would have done anything to go and play out in the field behind their house with their Labrador, Moxie.

Jason smiled to himself as he thought of this, glad that his sister had been here when he had trudged into the camp. His eyelids were slowly being pulled shut by lead weights, and he barely had time to lie down before sleep took him over.

-+-+-

He awoke later to high pitched screams. His immediate reaction was to jump up and see what was going on, but he felt that he could no sooner do that than swim across the Pacific. Instead, about halfway through the action of sitting up, his body threw itself sideways. He ended up with his head and top half of his body on the floor while the rest was still hooked onto the wire frame cot.

"What the hell is going on out there?" he heard Alex say to someone else as the noise got closer.

"I don't know, it sounds like Frank though," replied a male voice.

"Oh god, I hope not..." Alex groaned, pausing slightly as Jason pushed himself up off the floor. She was quickly beside him, helping him back into his bed while chiding him too.

"What the hell did you do? You're not supposed to get up! What did you think you were doing!"

"Didn't think, reaction, sorry!" Jason replied disjointedly while Alex took a breath and backed away. She was about to respond as the doors to post-op crashed open. Jason wheeled around to look, and had a sharp shock. He had never known that people could be green!

Standing in the door was a man with green covering him from head to toe. It looked slightly runny as well, as if he had gone swimming in a particularly scummy pond. He stomped across the room, spraying green everywhere, and stopped right in front of Alex and the man she had been talking with.

"Which one of you did this!" the green man yelled. "I know one of you did this!"

"Did what Frank, painted you green?" asked the man calmly. Alex was trying desperately not to laugh.

"You know fully well what you did Pierce, stop acting like you don't!"

"Hawkeye did nothing Frank," Alex managed to say around a fit of giggles. "It's not his fault that you're green with envy!" There was a moment of blubbering from the green man.

"You did it! You put the helmet filled with green paint above the tent door!"

"Absolutely not! I would _never_ do anything that juvenile. After all, Major Burns, I am a major as well, and can't be seen acting that way around junior officers!" Alex's voice had taken on a sarcastic tone as she wiped tears away from her eyes. "Then again, I wouldn't walk into a room after painting myself green either. It destroys a persons credibility. Unless you're pulling for a section eight..."

Frank blubbered for a moment before storming off out of the room, still sending little droplets of green everywhere. As soon as he was gone Alex burst into a fresh fit of giggles, and was joined in by Hawkeye, the other nurse and the majority of the conscious patients in the room. Jason was the only one who was completely lost in all of this.

"What just happened here?" he asked.

"Some serious payback, my dear brother," Alex gasped as she finally stopped laughing, seating herself on the end of Jason's cot. "Ah, revenge is so sweet!" Jason nodded slightly.

"I think I understand," he replied nervously, shifting as far away from his sister as he possibly could. "So, why did you need to issue payback?"

"Because Ferret Face is a major jerk," Hawkeye replied for Alex. "And if she doesn't need to blow off steam at him, I don't know who does." Jason eyed Hawkeye with a small amount of nervousness. For some strange reason he didn't like the doctor. Alex just beamed at him, which made Jason roll his eyes.

"As long as you don't get into too much trouble, eh?" he grumbled warningly. Alex continued to beam as she stood up and brushed off her pants.

"I think that I'm going to go and celebrate," she announced. "Do you want to come with me brother?"

"Sleeping is good, I think I'll do that," Jason replied, keeping as much sarcasm from his tone as possible as he lay back down. He felt very exhausted all of a sudden. Alex just shrugged and skipped off. She seemed very happy with herself.

For that one fact, Jason was grateful. Alex needed to be happy at least once in her life.

"You know what," Hawkeye said as he placed a clipboard down on the desk beside him, "your sister isn't half bad."

"No, she isn't is she." Jason yawned widely. "Pity that she's crazy."

-+-+-

Alex wrung her hands together as she walked around the compound, her mind drifting too her brother's sudden appearance. She wanted to know why he hadn't gone to a field unit rather than walking the immense distance that he had come to get to this MASH. It was eating through her brain like a mouse through cheese.

Well, it couldn't be too horrible. The worst she could think of was that something had happened back home to Meg's mother and he wanted to tell her in person rather than letting the horrible mail system deal with it.

She sighed and looked upwards, her eyes drifting past one of the hills nearby. A flash of light caught her eye and made her look back, hoping to spot just what it was that had made the light shimmer so. For a few moments, she looked and found nothing.

"Well," she muttered, "that was odd..." With a shake of her head, Alex began to walk back to her quarters. Two sets of eyes watched her warily, one much further away from the other and the closer with much more hatred.

The latter followed her, as stealthily as can be done in combat boots and green paint but with much ferocity, catching up with her only as she reached the door to her tent.

"Major!" Alex turned to look at Frank as he seethed towards her. She resisted the urge to smile, as he was still slightly scummy looking, and managed to look like she could not see the green paint still stuck in creases in his face.

"Yes? Anything I can do to help Major Burns?"

"I want you to tell me the truth, here and now!" his voice became conspiratorial, not losing any of the anger which it still held.

"All right," Alex replied, a smirk forming on her face, "But if its too close to the core, I won't answer." He eyed her carefully, obviously not quite sure what to believe.

"Did you have anything to do with the... incident this morning?"

"What incident?" Alex batted her eyelashes.

"You know, the _paint_ incident?"

"Oh!" Alex backed off and began to talk rather loudly, "the incident in which someone hung a helmet filled with green paint over your door and waited for you to walk in! No I had nothing to do with that. Now, if you don't mind..." She pulled away and began to walk into her tent. Frank grabbed her arm and pulled her back.

"I know you did!" he hissed, "and I'll prove it!"

"You do that," Alex snarled back. "You'll have a hard time doing it!" With that she wrenched her arm away and stormed into the tent, slamming the door shut with enough force to make it wobble slightly. Frank was left for a moment contemplating what on Earth had just happened before a few quiet chuckles broke him from his reverie. He wheeled around, his eyes beady eyes flashing as evilly as they could and promptly stormed off to Margaret's tent for some well needed comfort.

And that was when it happened.

-+-+-

No one had really been expecting it. They we're always on high alert for the little glitches and things, but this was not exactly little. A loud crack shattered the otherwise calm air and was swiftly swallowed up by the roar of a loud explosion. The lights and telephones immediately went down in the office, causing Radar to fall out of his chair in shock and Potter to let out a stream of potential curses. A few people moved out of their suddenly dark tents to see what had happened, a few of the more quick witted realized that the camp was on fire and went to deal with it. Hawkeye emerged from post-op in time to see these people fall over each other in a search for buckets and water to douse the flames. No one could truly tell what had happened, only that it needed to be dealt with.

For moments that seemed to drag on for an eternity they milled around like a ruptured ant's nest, frightened by the sudden circumstances that brought them into the light. Then came the child with the magnifying glass.

No one heard the first shot, but they all saw the blood blossom into the air like a mist. Whoever had been hit went down in a ragged pile, dead before they hit the ground. Hawkeye pulled himself back in against the door as another shot cracked right beside his head. He didn't have any time to be afraid as he pushed his head out once more.

"Get inside!" he yelled at the top of his lungs. "There's a sniper!"

-+-+

Alex felt, rather than heard the man collapse beside her. She whipped around, her body moving with speed but her mind sluggish, and fell to her knees beside him, immediately checking for a pulse. She could hear people yelling as she tried to get a strong enough grip on the man's throat to feel the pulse in his carotid artery, but the blood prevented her from even holding her fingers steady for a second.

There was a momentary pause as she looked at the man's face, and found herself unable to recognize him. Slowly her sluggish mind caught up to what she was seeing. He no longer _had_ a face to recognize.

She pulled her hands away and looked up, realizing that she was the only one in the group of people who had not left to duck for cover. Dragging her eyes back to the dead man in front of her, she found herself standing, running away while leaving him there.

_Stop it. He's dead._

She forced herself to look towards her destination, not where she had been. _Live in the future damn it, you don't even know the guy._ She could feel tears stinging her cheeks but couldn't assimilate that she was crying.

Less than ten feet away another man stumbled with blood spraying from his chest, and Alex felt a rock crash through her shoulder.

-+-+-

Meg watched the young man go down, her eyes completely on him. She hadn't even noticed Alex before she ducked down beside him and applied pressure to the wound. Her hands were covered in blood already, but with the oozing that was coming out of the man's chest she found that she didn't really want to worry about any cross contamination problems right now.

For a few moments everything was still but then a puff of dirt made Alex jump to attention once more. She grabbed the man's arm and began to pull him with her towards the half open door of the post-op.

If someone were to ask Meg later what had happened in the five seconds between Alex dragging the man along and her slamming the doors of the post-op shut, blood flying from her hands in a vehement attempt to keep herself from hurting someone, she would have told you that she could not remember.

"Damn it!" Alex yelled, still shaking blood from her fingers and angry tears streaming down her cheeks. "The bloody bastards... I'll kill them, I'll..." she trailed off with a low whine of pain and sank to the floor. "What the hell happened?" For a moment no one answered. Hawkeye and Meg exchanged a glance as if they were asking each other what had happened.

"The generator exploded," someone began softly, " I saw it happen. The sniper took a pot shot at the generator and it just exploded."

"They do that," someone else responded. Alex recognized him as one of Jason's squad, Zander, she thought he had been called. "They like to draw people out and then take pot shots at them. It happened to us once..." He shrugged nervously and looked at his feet. Meg looked to Alex and saw her staring at the man she had dragged into the building.

"Who was he?" she asked softly. Hawkeye grabbed the man's dog tags and sighed slightly.

"Private Jacob Barrington." he was silent for a moment and looked slowly to catch her eyes. "He only got here last week." Alex nodded and turned away slightly. She was incredibly pale.

"I don't feel so well..." she said softly before throwing up, the image of the faceless solider pushing it's way to the front of her mind. Meg was immediately at her side, gripping her shoulder for support. She couldn't understand why Alex whined and attempted to pull away from the grip until her finger slipped through a hole in the shirt.

"Oh Jesus," she whispered, letting go of Alex's shoulder and pulling down the collar of her shirt. "She's been hit."

A/N: Well, appauling cliff hanger I know. The story should move pretty well from now on, but I don't know when it will be finished. I hope that you all have enjoyed this addition. Tell me if you didn't so I can fix it. Tell me if you did to make me write more!

A great thanks to you all!


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